


it's just my soul responding (to the heavy art of holding)

by thesecretdetectivecollection



Series: i lost love, but i found you [4]
Category: Football RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-14
Updated: 2018-06-14
Packaged: 2019-05-23 04:35:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14927240
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesecretdetectivecollection/pseuds/thesecretdetectivecollection
Summary: Gary gets sacked and comes back to London.Jamie, for whatever reason, thinks inviting him to dinner at his and David's flat is a good idea.





	1. Chapter 1

It’s a few months later that Gary gets sacked.

 

He shows up at Jamie’s door, uses the spare key, and looks around inside at the empty house. He goes upstairs and he looks at the bed, perfectly made, and hates that he knows David’s the one who made it—Jamie hadn’t made his bed since he was about twelve, probably. He looks inside the closet. It’s almost empty. There are a few things left, and when Gary shakes them out, he realizes they’re his. A kit of his, folded up and hidden on a high shelf, some of his t-shirts that Jamie’d stolen without him noticing.

 

He doesn’t cry, but he does take a picture and send it to Jamie. _Wish you were here to welcome me home,_ he writes, because his pride’s long since abandoned him, _you wore this kit better than I did, love._

 

Jamie sees the message and considers calling him, but decides against it. It feels too intimate, to hear his voice. There’s no opportunity to hide emotions that way, and they both deserve to be able to hide from each other after all of this. He texts him back instead. _You’re home? For good?_

 

 _Got sacked. Never managing again, nobody’s ever gonna hire me_ , Gary writes before deleting it all.

 

_For good, yeah. Missed being home. Even though learning Spanish was easier than learning Scouse._

 

He hesitates, reads over the joke, deletes the period at the end, and adds a winking emoji just so Jamie won’t have any doubts about it being a joke. He changes it to the winking kiss, because Gary knows what he wants, and it’s small way to ask for it, so maybe it won’t hurt as much when he doesn’t get it.

 

_Come over for dinner? David’s making steaks, we’d love to see you._

_We._ That was the sort of couple they were, then, the sort that went around saying _we_ because they just knew each other so well. The sort that lived together, obviously, since their flat—Jamie’s flat, now, was nearly empty of personal belongings, other than a few pictures scattered around. He sits on the bed, on Jamie’s side.

 

David had slept on the same side, he remembers, and wonders which one of them adjusted. He opens the nightstand and sees condoms, the box mostly full, and lube, the jar nearly empty. There are a couple of pain meds—for Jamie’s hangovers, and David’s special migraine pills. It paints a painfully vivid picture, and he opens the second drawer instead.

 

There are a few pictures, all turned face down and Gary knows what they are even without looking, recognizes the frames, knows what he’ll see. He doesn’t bother turning them over, doesn’t think he could stand it.

 

His phone buzzes, a reminder of Jamie’s text, and he looks at it. No emojis, perfect punctuation, not a single hint of whether the offer’s genuine or made out of politeness, or a sense of duty, or because David wanted him to…

 

He’d always suspected Jamie was a bit of a masochist, the way he leaned into pain when he worked out, but Gary just now realizes that he’s just as bad, because he types out a painful _I’d love to_ and presses send before he lets himself overthink it.

 

 _Great. See you at 7, our address is 4239 Blueacre East._ Another text arrives a moment later, with the nearest train stop and cross street. _Our address_. As if Gary was an idiot who hadn’t picked up on the clues the first time round, when he’d called them. There had been other times, too. When he’d called and the phone had gone to voicemail and when Jamie picked up, he was panting, and it was too late for a workout, which left only one thing. There were times on telly when Jamie’s hand covered David’s and just rested there, completely unabashed. As if Gary hadn’t gotten it when he’d read that _we’d love to see you_.

 

Then again, maybe it’s not a hint. Maybe it’s just how Jamie is, now. Maybe they just are a _we_ , maybe it’s got nothing to do with Gary and he isn’t nearly as important as he thinks he is.

 

He’d known couples that had fallen hard and fast before, and some of them were still together. Maybe that’s how Jamie and David would be. A happy accident, with only one broken Neville as a casualty.

 

He wishes Phil was here with him. But he hadn’t gotten sacked. Just him. Just Gary.

 

 _The lesser Neville_. Jamie had been joking, of course, had meant it in good humor, but the old joke tastes a little bitter in Gary’s mouth now.

 

He leaves Jamie’s flat, making sure he’s locked the door and put everything back the way he found it, and goes back to his own place.

 

They’d basically lived at Jamie’s before he’d gone, so home is familiar, but sterile and empty. There’s some dust on the furniture, the fridge is empty, there’s a box of pasta and a couple cans of vegetables in the cupboards and not much else besides.

 

 _Good thing they’re covering dinner tonight_ , he thinks sardonically to himself, not even cracking a smile. He sits down on the sofa, letting himself sink sideways until he’s laying on his side, kicking off his shoes and toeing off his socks.

 

He considers turning on the television, watching something stupid and mindless, but he knows that football’s off limits for awhile, and so are sports movies, and so is the news, because that was not only depressing but also made him feel bad for feeling bad when the world was going to shit around him—in the end, he doesn’t bother. He turns on some music, something quiet with no lyrics he can impose his pain on, and closes his eyes.

 

When he wakes up, he’s disoriented in the darkness, a stark contrast to the afternoon sunshine pouring through the windows when he’d drifted off. He reaches for his phone, only to find the battery’s dead, and turns on the tv just to have some light as he stands up and stumbles into the kitchen to check the microwave for the time.

 

It doesn’t make sense, though. The microwave says 7:18. And that doesn’t make sense. It can’t be 7:18. He has dinner with Jamie and David at 7.

 

It takes another ten seconds before his foggy brain manages to piece together that the clock is not wrong and he is not right. He rummages through his suitcase for his phone charger, because not only is his phone dead, but he can’t remember the damn address.

 

He half-considers just not going, half considers just staying at home and going to bed. He’s not particularly hungry anyway, he tells himself, and watching Jamie and David be all lovey-dovey isn’t going to particularly help in that regard. It’s a stupid idea anyway, to go to their house. What is he expecting, exactly? For Jamie to stand him next to David and look them over and still choose him somehow? For Jamie to see him and fall into his arms crying about how wrong he was? For Jamie to hold him and tell him it’s okay that he’s a failure, to somehow pretend that David isn’t an upgrade in every sense of the word?

 

He heads over to the fridge and looks at the spot where he normally keeps the wine. Nothing.

 

He closes the fridge with a heavy sigh and crosses over to the cabinet he keeps the hard liquor in, and it’s all gone.

 

 _Water, water everywhere, and not a drop to drink,_ he thinks bitterly.

 

That’s the thing that makes him decide to go, in the end. Maybe, at the very least, Jamie and David will have alcohol they’ll be willing to give their pitiful dinner guest.

 

After he explains why he’s so late and disheveled and still wearing the same clothes he traveled in.

 

 _I’m already late,_ he reasons, _what’s the harm in being a bit later?_ He plugs in his phone and waits for it to turn back on, heading to the bathroom to swish some mouthwash. As it starts to burn, he realizes smugly that it has alcohol in it, and instead of spitting it out, he swallows it, trying to make himself a little less terrified. By the time he’s back, the phone is lit up, screen full of all the calls he'd missed during his impromptu nap—six from Jamie, three from David, and the half dozen text messages interspersed between them.

 

He phones Jamie up as he steps outside and hails a cab, explaining the situation as best he can, which in this case means making a fragile excuse and a weak apology as the taxi inches through London’s streets, congested even now.

 

He sighs, but eventually he makes it to the right address and almost wishes he hadn’t as he walks up the steps. He wishes he was still asleep, phone dead, at peace for a little while longer.

 

But he isn’t, and going back home now is no longer an option, since they’ve probably seen him through the window. He rings the bell and waits a couple minutes before he gets buzzed in. The lobby is large and classically beautiful, pale marble floors gleaming because of _course_ that’s what David went for. The elevators are easy to find and he goes up to Jamie and David’s flat.

 

No wonder Jamie decided to move in here instead of David joining him in his flat—in what used to be _their_ flat.

 

Jamie’s the one who opens the door, and David stands behind him, but he keeps a hand on Jamie’s back, and meets Gary’s eyes unflinchingly.

 

“Hi, Gary,” Jamie says softly, “how are you doing?”

 

Gary’s heart expands in his chest, a rush of love for Jamie coursing through him, intertwined with the pain of not being able to kiss him. He steps forward nonetheless and pulls Jamie into his arms.

 

“Better now that I’ve seen you,” he mumbles against Jamie’s neck, and Jamie laughs.

 

“What a charmer,” he says, voice so light it completely disregards the flirtation, turns it into a joke between friends and demolishes whatever meager hopes Gary’d been nursing. He pulls away from the hug and steps back a bit.

 

“Hi, Gary,” David says quietly, smiling a little bit. He steps in for a hug, too, but Gary extends his hand for a handshake instead, too close to David’s chest. David manages the situation gracefully. Of course he does. The last time he was awkward was when his voice was still cracking.

 

“Hello, David.” The words aren’t overtly hostile, but they’re too polite for old friends, and all three of them can see that.

 

Jamie hesitates for a moment, glances between David and Gary, and the façade of cheerful host flickers for a moment before it comes back full force.

 

“Come in, come in, Gary,” he says brightly, “let me take your coat—look at your hair! You were in Spain for a few months and now you’re too good for an umbrella?”

 

Gary smiles at him and hands him his coat, following him into the kitchen.

 

“Love, do we need to put the food in the oven to warm up a bit?”

 

David smiles. “I’ll go check, Jaybird.” The endearment is casual. Maybe just a little bit _too_ casual. Then again, Gary might just be a bit on edge.

 

“Jaybird, huh? That’s cute.”

 

Jamie shrugs, and Gary knows him well enough to see that he’s doubting the decision to invite his ex and his partner’s ex to dinner. Gary seizes on the weakness.

 

“This is incredibly fucked up, you know,” he continues, careful to remain conversational, “you two shacking up and inviting me to dinner as if we’re best mates still.”

 

Jamie goes pale. “I didn’t mean for you to get hurt,” he says quietly, leading him into the living room, away from David.

 

“Doesn’t matter, really. That’s what happened, regardless of what you meant, James.”

 

“If you really cared about me, don’t you think you’d be happy that I’m happy?”

 

“I’m a selfish bastard, then. I want you to be happy, but I want you to be happy with _me_.”

 

Jamie sighs, and in the moment, he looks weary and old, and it makes Gary’s heart squeeze in his chest. “I can set you up with someone, if you want?”

 

“Why, you think the best way to get over one guy is to get under another? Is that how you and David got together?”

 

Jamie looks at him for a moment, completely silent. “I know you’re hurting,” he says, voice low, “but that’s no excuse to hurt me.” He turns around and leaves him there, in the living room that Jamie and David share, with the art on the walls, and two framed kits hanging by the window, with the same number and different names.

 

Gary doesn’t know what he feels anymore, or rather, he wishes he didn’t know. But it’s all there, starkly illuminated in his soul. There’s numbness, but under that, there’s a sharp pain in his chest, a hollow ache in his gut, and anger tinged with bitterness.

 

He looks out the window, and wishes he was outside. Wishes that he hadn’t said yes to this stupid farce. Wishes he was still at home sleeping.

 

Wishes he’d never gone to Spain.

 

He’s still wallowing a few minutes later when David comes into the room. “Dinner’s ready.”

 

Gary nods, and when he looks at him, David’s jaw is clenched.

 

“Don’t you think you’ve hurt him enough?” he asks quietly, looking at Gary. He doesn’t wait for a response, just turns on his heel and returns to the kitchen, leaving Gary to follow miserably behind.

 

Dinner is quiet and tense. Everyone uses impeccable table manners, a polite shield from any real intimacy.

 

Jamie rises and fetches the dessert, rich caramel brownies with vanilla ice cream, and Gary pretends not to notice that he and David split one.

 

The conversation warms just slightly when David brings up an old memory from United training. Gary’s surprised at how unsurprised Jamie actually is. He’d never told him that story before, but apparently David had.

 

The tension in the room eases for a few minutes, and Gary doesn’t feel like crawling out of his own skin from the awkwardness for a little while. It’s a blessed reprieve from the rest of the evening, and unfortunately, it’s brief. They all finish their dessert and sit back, looking at the empty dishes.

 

David looks over at Jamie and doesn’t say anything, but the look they exchange says enough. It’s a check in to see how they’re each handling it, and David’s brow furrows slightly at something in Jamie’s face, some tiny, invisible sign of fatigue.

 

Gary takes the hint and rises to his feet. “I’m gonna head out, it’s getting late.”

 

It isn’t. The lie is transparent, and still Jamie and David don’t call him out on it.

 

“Have a good night, Gaz,” Jamie says, sounding tired.

 

“I’ll do the dishes tonight, love,” he hears David say softly, wrapping his arms around Jamie while Gary goes out to the coat closet.

 

“Leave them until the morning. Let’s just go to bed, Davey-boy.”

 

There’s the gentle sound of a kiss, and Gary ignores the swirl of emotions in his chest—the pain, the regret. The anger’s all gone now, and he’s sorry that he’s hurt Jamie, at least.

 

They join him in the hallway a moment later.

 

“I’m sorry I’ve been awful,” Gary says quietly, “I hope you two are happy together. J, you deserve to be happy.”

 

Jamie smiles weakly and says goodbye, and David shakes his hand, squeezing the bones of Gary’s hand together in a tight grip. He takes it without complaint, figuring he deserves the punishment, though maybe it is a bit much when added to the inevitable thoughts he'll have tonight of Jamie and David together in bed.

\---

  
David hugs Jamie, as soon as Gary’s gone. “Come on, love, let’s go to bed,” he whispers, and Jamie closes his eyes and nods.

 

They’re settled into bed, clothes tossed haphazardly onto the floor, when Jamie finally says something. “He hates us _._ He _hates_ us, Davey.”

 

David doesn’t know quite what to say. He loves Jamie enough to want to fight for him, and he doesn’t pity Gary so much that he’d give up the best relationship he had ever had for him.

 

“He’s behaving like a child, Jaybird. He’s throwing a tantrum and trying to get his way, that’s all.”

 

Jamie nods and tucks his nose against David’s neck, inhaling slowly and filling his lungs with the scent of Armani cologne. “I love you. I’m sad that he’s sad, but I love you, and I don’t regret anything.”

 

“Really? Not even that time you were sucking me off from under the table in the dressing room and someone walked in on us? I had to hide you between my legs under the table, babe!” David teases, just to make him smile.

 

“Okay, maybe I do regret that one a little bit,” Jamie agrees, and his muscles begin to relax as they keep talking, and Gary, for once, doesn’t come up once. For the first time, it feels like the air between them is truly clear of his presence. He isn’t haunting them anymore.

 

Jamie had seen him, and he’d half-expected a surge of something, some tender hint of affection that he’d long since buried. He’d been pleasantly surprised when he hadn’t found it, though. He’d looked on Gary’s face, aged by stress, and felt concern, and maybe a hint of pity, as he would for any friend.

 

 _I can finally stop overthinking it_ , he marvels, as David’s lips press against his hair and his eyes drift shut _._

_It’s done._

\---


	2. Chapter 2

Life moves on, after that. Jamie and David still love each other, and after the season ends, they travel together. They start in Ibiza, drinking and dancing at clubs and coming back to their hotel room to do a rather different type of dancing before they go to bed.

 

(David thinks that Jamie giving him a drunken striptease is both the most adorable thing he’s ever seen and also the absolute sexiest… until he falls over and then there’s a sharp feeling of panic that doesn’t go away until he hears Jamie giggling and holding up his arms to be picked up.)

 

They go to Italy, walking through beautiful vineyards and holding hands. They eat delicious food and go skinny dipping at midnight. One night, they pack a picnic and go outside and just stay there all night, waking up curled up together on a blanket that’s damp from the morning dew. Their backs ache from the night on the grass, but they laugh and kiss and it becomes a story to tell and a memory to keep instead of an inconvenience. David takes him to Milan and he gets to hear him speaking Italian. David apologizes, says he’s terribly rusty, but Jamie can’t tell, and he thinks it’s perfect. And if it’s not perfect, that still doesn’t detract from how hot it is.

 

Then again, maybe Jamie’s a bit biased, and maybe he just likes to watch David’s lips move fluidly around the words.

 

David thinks that might be it, especially when Jamie begs him to speak Italian in bed, when he’s barely able to get a word out in _English_ , let alone in half-forgotten Italian.

 

He still tries, though, in the morning when they’re half-asleep and before their eyes drift shut at night.

 

Even when they come home, he’ll drop a few words of Italian or Spanish or French as they do chores around the house, or when they’re watching television, and Jamie always flushes red. He can never hide it, how much he likes hearing his lad speak. It makes David’s stomach go warm and liquid for a moment, and he always has to tip Jamie’s chin up and kiss him when he goes shy like that.

 

“You make me so happy,” Jamie says one night, only half-awake. The words are almost more special than  _I love you_ , somehow. Jamie’s loved before, David knows, and so has he, but never before has someone told David he makes them happy like this. His heart swells with gratitude and love and he hugs Jamie closer, kissing his cheek.

\---

 

 

The days after the dinner pass agonizingly slowly. Gary orders takeout for a few days, until he gets a sudden burst of energy and goes grocery shopping. He finds a gym nearby, and goes to work out at five in the morning, when the place is nice and empty. He goes home to Manchester, and visits with Tracey and his parents.

 

He travels to the United States for a few weeks, gets himself lost in the flood of people in New York, lays on the beach in Miami, goes to bars and clubs in Los Angeles until he gets drunk and takes someone home for a one-night stand that’s more satisfying than any hookup has the right to be.

 

Maybe it’s the company he missed, more than the man himself, he muses. Maybe it was the safety, the comfort. Jamie isn’t the only person who can give him that, is he?

 

He takes a social media hiatus for awhile, deletes Twitter and Instagram from his phone. He takes photos from his travels, but he only sends them to his family and Scholesy. He buys presents for Phil’s kids, and he gives money to homeless people whenever he can. Weeks turn into months, and he doesn't feel homesick, so he stays.

 

Suddenly six months have passed, and he’s living in San Francisco, enjoying the mild Bay Area weather. He could go back to Europe, and he will, eventually. It doesn’t hurt as much anymore, he admits.

 

He finds a lad at a bar one night, after he’s been there for nine months or so, and they date. He’s nothing like Jamie or David. Tom has light brown skin and beautiful green eyes—he’s half-Tunisian and half-French, but he was raised in Indiana. He knows who Gary is, and they talk about it, sometimes, in the darkness of Gary’s bedroom. But more often than not, they just drink beers and watch trashy reality tv. Tom gets him into American football, which is good except for the infuriating number of advertisements. He also gets him into basketball, which is better because it’s nothing like football at all.

 

He thinks of Jamie less and less as he settles into a new life, and one day, the pain goes away enough for him to think about football again. He signs up to coach a local youth league, not professional or even an academy, just local kids who want to play with their friends. The days fly by, as he coaches young kids and watches MLS games and lets Tom fall asleep in his lap, because Tom isn’t much into football, really.

 

Eventually, Christmas of the next year rolls around, and he goes home to see his family.

 

Being back in England is strange. It’s been long enough now that he’s no longer interesting. He’s not a footballer. He’s not even a disgraced manager. He’s just a guy now. Hell, he’s not even on telly anymore.

 

He opens Twitter one day, aimlessly scrolling, and sees Jamie tweeting at David, something soft and flirtatious and teasing. David’s responded within minutes of the first tweet, in the same tone. He still calls him Jaybird.

 

It still aches, losing them, but it’s an older pain, now, like bad knees instead of a broken leg.

 

Soon, though, he has a message from Tom. He always knows, somehow, when Gary needs him, even if they’re oceans apart. Jamie and David don’t matter as much anymore, not when he’s got his own lad to flirt with, when he’s checking in on his kids on the team and how they’re doing and listening to Tom whinging about work and traffic and _when are you coming back, baby? I miss you so much._

_Soon. I’ll be home soon, love, just need to see the family, and next year we’ll do Christmas at ours._

 

Sometimes things don’t work out. It was unfortunate that it hadn’t worked out with Jamie, especially since Gary had loved him more than anyone he’d ever met before. Tom isn’t like that. It isn’t all-encompassing, his love for Tom. It’s slow, and soft, and it snuck up on him, really. Tom was just supposed to be a fuck buddy, in all honesty. But Gary really wasn’t made for casual sex, and by the time they’d slept together a handful of times, he was talking to him, and they were being open and honest and intimate in more ways than just the physical.

 

Gary enjoys America. He enjoys that he can go under the radar more, that he can go an entire day with nobody asking for an autograph if he’s lucky. He enjoys that he can hold hands with Tom in public, or take him out to a club and dance with him as if he’s not forty-one years old with his hair starting to gray.

 

One day, a long, long time after he leaves, he scrolls through Instagram—he still isn’t back on officially, but he scrolls through his friends’ social media accounts now and again, just to check in on familiar faces—and he sees a picture of Jamie with a ring on his finger.

 

It’s nothing ostentatious, just a simple silver band around his ring finger as if it's always been there. David’s in the photo too, with a casual arm thrown around his colleague. He’s wearing a ring too.

 

Gary can’t quite overcome the curiosity and googles him, finding dozens of articles hypothesizing that he’d gotten back with his ex-wife.

 

Gary knows better, though.

 

He’s surprised, first at the news and then at his own reaction.

 

He sends David a text. _Good for you, mate. Finally made an honest man out of him._

 

He’s equal parts surprised and pleased to find that he’s not upset. It’s always going to be odd that his exes have gone and gotten married, but he isn’t heartbroken anymore.

 

Maybe one day, he’ll even be happy for them.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This series was a bit of a roller coaster, and it's been a long time since I started it, but here we are. Thanks to all those who read and commented on each story, and I hope you're satisfied with the conclusion. 
> 
> The End.


End file.
